Annual black bear hunt has its backers and detractors

Many use event for family bonding, but at least one feels it sends the wrong message

Kaitlin Zembower had gone deer hunting with her father Jerry countless times over the years near their Frostburg home, but the experience they shared during last year's annual Maryland black bear hunt was much different.

Though Jerry Zembower had seen the same bear every day on his way to work in the week leading up to the hunt, he and his daughter didn't see any, let alone shoot one, during their hunt.

But Kaitlin wouldn't trade those hours last October for any other time she had spent with her dad hunting.

"When we go deer hunting, we're usually in different places," said Kristin Zembower, a 20-year old senior at Frostburg University who is in the school's Wildlife and Fisheries program. "When we were out for the bear hunt, we were there together. It was great to have that experience to be with him. It really matters."

Said the elder Zembower, the president of the Allegany-Garrett Sportsmen's Association: "It's a good type of bonding experience. You learn about all kinds of things — you learn about nature, your family. It's a good time."

Many families like the Zembowers will share the same experience this week when the annual black bear hunt opens Monday, but those opposing the hunt — which was reinstituted in 2004 after a 50-year absence — say filling the family room with mementos can be done in much more humane way.

"We don't have to go killing a black bear to build family memories — that's outrageous," said Joe Lamp, who served 14 years on the state's Wildlife Advisory Committee. "You can certainly do that with a Nikon not a Weatherby [hunting rifle]."

In particular, Lamp is opposed to children under the age of 16 who have either been issued tags to the bear hunt or will be taken along by those who are among the state-record 340 invitees to the event, which Lamp and others call "nothing more than a trophy hunt".

While Kaitlin Zembower did not kill a bear in her first bear hunt a year ago, young hunters have made their place in the event's local lore.

Sierra Stiles of Kitzmiller was 8 when she shot and killed a 211-pound bear only 30 minutes into the second year of the hunt's revival in 2005. A year ago, another young Kitzmiller resident was one of six under the age of 15 who killed bears during what was a four-day hunt.

The 376-pound bear 12-year old Colton Lucas killed had been menacing the town near the West Virginia border by turning over trash bins and making his way onto the porches of several homes to get to the bird feed. Colton was hailed as something of a local hero, and his father Joe, who had never had taken part in the bear hunt after years of trying to get a tag, said "he created a memory in his own backyard."

Harry Spiker, a bear biologist for the Department of Natural Resources who manages the bear hunt, said the event is much different from deer hunting. Getting a permit for the bear hunt is viewed in the Maryland hunting community as "winning the lottery," Spiker said. More than 4,000 applied for the permits issued this year — also a record.

A quota of between 80 and 100 bears killed has been set by the state to reduce a growing population of bears that, according to Spiker, has moved east — even into Montgomery and Prince George's counties — in recent years.

"If you draw a tag [for the bear hunt], you don't know if you're going to get one for another five or 10 years," Spiker said.

Those who receive tags for the bear hunt are allowed to bring up to two others with them, and Spiker said that often involves family members, because "is partly about building family camaraderie and having the opportunity to build that memory if you will."

But Lamp doesn't think the bear hunt is about adding to the family scrapbook or the hunter's house decor. Among the piles of letters and legal documents detailing Lamp's unsuccessful fight to shut down the bear hunt is a Baltimore Sun clipping from 2004 about the opening day of the hunt.

In it, the 8-year old Stiles, who received one of the 192 permits given that year, told a reporter that she wanted to turn the dead animal "into a rug."

That's just the kind of statement Lamp said supports his argument for not allowing children under the age of 16 to be allowed to hunt.

"There's no age restriction on getting a hunting license in Maryland. Kids 5 years old and up have gotten hunting licenses," Lamp said. "We know the human brain is not fully developed until they are in their early 20s. The critical area for reasoning, decision making on the spur of the moment, is not developed. ... I have a huge, huge problem with youth hunting."

Lamp questions how adults can be arrested for leaving children 8 and under unattended in their homes, but "not for letting them go hunting in the woods. ... .My concern is that you're doing a lot of harm to a kid. He's or she's is probably not aware of what they're actually doing, taking a life of a scentian creature."